The Nobody Girls (Kendra Dillon Cold Case Thriller Book 3), Rebecca Rane [best book club books of all time txt] 📗

know that I can. Maybe though, after all this time, he’s found Jesus. No one has done a thing about this story in over twenty years. A lot can change.”

“True. Well, good luck. Are you sure you don’t want me to come with you?”

“No, I mean, I can’t have you with me in the room when I interview him, so basically, it’s another four-hour drive for no reason. Just find the Hawkins family for me. That would be a really great piece of this puzzle.”

“Got it.”

Chapter 19

Kendra made the drive the next morning. Visiting a prisoner in the facility was a rigorous process. Much less interviewing a prisoner for a podcast.

Kendra drove most of the way with no music and only her thoughts about the case to keep her company. There was no space right now in her brain for music or even Kyle Carver. Who’d been completely out of her life, the moment he’d walked out of her life.

Heck, she had another two hours before she got to Lucasville, so she gave it a whirl. Maybe he’d talk to her? She did miss him. They’d talked about cases, laughed about their lives, and really seemed to fit.

Somewhat on impulse, she said, “Siri, dial Kyle.”

He picked up after one ring. “Are you okay?” was his first line.

“I’m fine, kind of an odd way to answer the phone.”

“You’re kind of an odd person.”

“I know. How have you been?”

“Okay, surprisingly quiet here the last few weeks. Doing a lot of requests for search warrants, not too exciting to report. You?”

“I’ve been haunting truck stops and gas stations, looking for anything I can on this Nobody Girls story. On the way to Lucasville now actually, to interview the guy they think did it.”

“By yourself?”

“The interview, yeah. Of course, it’s a max facility, only one visitor per person.”

“No, I mean this truck stop business. You’re just driving around to dangerous places by yourself?”

There was an edge to Kyle’s voice. Kendra hadn’t meant to cause trouble. She’d meant to see if they could talk.

“I’m fine. It’s fine. I just called because I missed talking to you.”

Kyle didn’t respond for a second. “I’ve got to go. Kendra, be careful. You should have backup when you’re out there. It’s basic.”

“Talk to you later, Kyle,” Kendra ended the call.

That did not go the way she’d intended. At all. Kyle did not understand her and had developed a protective streak that made getting along impossible. She shouldn’t have reached out. She felt foolish now.

Kendra had a story to do and an interview to focus on. She felt like she owed the victims her full attention when talking to Ned Wayne Ewald. She may be a total screw-up in the romance department, but she knew this job. And she’d do it her way.

She finished the last stretch of the drive channeling her mother. Stephanie Dillon didn’t let people get in her way. Kendra wouldn’t either.

As she got closer to the prison, signs warned drivers not to pick up hitchhikers. Yeah, no kidding, one of them might be a homicidal maniac.

Kendra had waited a long time for this to come through. And she really didn’t expect it to happen. But Ewald had said yes. They’d filled out the proper paperwork and had read the rules for media visits.

Normally, a visitor wouldn’t be allowed to bring in an electronic device, even so much as an Apple Watch was prohibited. But Kendra had worked with Agent Price, and Price worked with the institution to get Kendra access and the ability to record the conversation. It wasn’t usual, and Kendra knew Price had done a lot to make this happen.

Lucasville was nestled in the hills. It was scenic, really, until you noticed the barbed wire and guard tower. Prisons were depicted all the time on television or in the movies. But the reality was different. They don’t tell you what it smells like. It didn’t smell bad, that Kendra could say, but somehow the air felt as trapped as the people incarcerated.

There was also a coldness born of steel and cement. And there was the complete dependence on someone else for everything. Kendra knew that she depended on the prison employees while she was there. She wasn’t a prisoner. She could come and go, but not until they opened the doors or closed them. That dependency produced a dread that hovered over you, even if you knew you weren’t going to be there for long.

And you didn’t see rows of inmates like in the movies. You saw one or two who worked there, but that was it. Everything else was further inside, a place Kendra was curious about on the one hand but also glad she didn’t have access to. Everything was contained and orderly, Kendra noticed. There was a studied quiet as though you knew this building was explosive. No one wanted to move fast or talk loudly lest they ignite something.

Kendra had to take all that in and then ignore it.

The sights and sounds or feel of this place weren’t the center of the story she was telling. Ned Wayne Ewald was. Ewald was seventy-nine years old now. He suffered from hyper-tension, according to the information she’d been provided. He’d been here longer than she’d been alive.

The mug shot she’d gotten from Agent Price’s files, taken shortly after he was arrested for murder, depicted a 29-year-old man. He was young then. He had thick dark hair, parted on the side, and neatly combed. She thought it looked slightly greasy.

A description of him also mentioned that he normally wore a ball cap, so the few security cameras available at the time obscured his face.

He was 5’10,” but on the outside, he’d worn cowboy boots to look six feet. One witness called his look “Urban Cowboy.” But it was a look you’d still see today. A lot of young men raised in the upper Midwest donned the trappings of what they thought Nashville might be.

He was muscular, not in a gym rat